#151 | Throw Back Episode - #056 Vladimir Pacheco Cueva (Professor, Researcher, Author) - Project Academia & Industry, International Governance, Economic Diversification & Living with COVID

Throw back to one of our favorites, in case you missed it! 

Vladimir Pacheco is currently an Associate Professor in Governance and coordinator of the International Studies programme at the Department of Global Studies in the School of Culture and Society, Aarhus University, Denmark. 

His current research interests include analyzing the governance mechanisms, economic policy prescriptions, and socio-economic impacts of resource extraction in Latin America and beyond. Before this position, Vladimir held senior roles in Australia with the Foundation for Development Cooperation, the Centre for Social Responsibility in Mining, and consulting firm WorleyParsons. 

Vladimir is also the Program Coordinator of Project Empire, a long-term partnership between Agile Management Office and Aarhus University bringing the academic and the corporate world together for an enriching and inspiring educational experience.

In this episode we cover: 

His current research into resource-dependent countries and economic diversification 

He shares his journey of living with COVID0-19 after his diagnosis earlier this year on his return from Europe

Understanding and learn more about international governance 

Our partnership and the outcomes of the recent academic/corporate program and;

Why he tried to ride his bicycle from Queensland, Australia to India amongst earlier childhood lessons from escaping the civil war and learning to speak English in America. 

And much more...

You can read some of Vladimir's interests here:

https://www.gapminder.org/

https://resourcegovernance.org/analysis-tools/publications/diversification-resource-dependent-countries

https://www.business-humanrights.org/en/from-us/briefings/towards-responsible-renewable-energy/

To connect with Vladimir: 

https://pure.au.dk/portal/da/persons/vla

Transcript

Journey Through COVID

Fatimah Abbouchi 0:00

You're listening to Agile Ideas, the podcast hosted by Fatima Rabouchi. For anyone listening out there not having a good day, please know there is help out there, Vladimir. Welcome to the show.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 0:14

Thank you, Fatima. I'm happy to be here with you and the audience.

Fatimah Abbouchi 0:19

Amazing, amazing. And you are on this podcast all the way from Denmark, which we'll delve into a little bit more, so all the way on the other side of the world. I've already told our listeners a little bit about yourself, but in your own words maybe, if you want to just give us a bit of an overview of what you've done and what you're doing today.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 0:40

Yeah, so, as you probably already told the audience, I'm an associate professor here at the University of Aarhus. Aarhus is the second largest city in Denmark after Copenhagen and the university is the largest employer. I am here. I teach many things here. I teach project management, I teach courses in political economy and also how to thesis guidance. I have a course, an online course, to prepare students for their thesis, and I also do research in the area of governance of natural resources and the impacts of natural resources. And before I used to work in microfinance when I was in Australia, microfinance in the Pacific and in Asia, and before that I used to be an academic at the University of the South Pacific. So I've done a little bit of everything Well, not everything, but a little bit of different things in my career. Beautiful, beautiful, yes.

Fatimah Abbouchi 2:09

It would be really good to delve deeper into that. You've got a mixture of academic and then you've also worked in the consulting world, which we'll touch on a little bit more. But to kick us off today, I'm interested to know what was the most frustrating thing that happened to you last week.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 2:26

What was the most frustrating thing that happened to you last week? So well, the most frustrating thing, perhaps, is related to the best thing that happened, because I finally made it here to Denmark after a very, very long trip. After a very, very long trip. Perhaps I should tell you a little bit about what our plans were. My wife and I lived here in Denmark for six years, but we were planning to go back to New Zealand this year and she got a job there, so she had to go earlier than me. She went there with one of my daughters I have two daughters. She went there in January to start a job and I was supposed to go there in March, you know, after the half of the semester with my oldest daughter. So what happened was that, of course, they closed the borders and I was at the airport and both my daughter and I were denied boarding because we were traveling on Australian passports and not on New Zealandports. My wife is Kiwi, so we said to them we are a family unit and they're expecting us, and they said no, borders are closed. Okay, so it's the first time that's ever happened to me, actually. So I decided to travel to Australia instead, so I bought a ticket the following day and we traveled there.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 4:08

And this is before Australia was requiring people to self-isolate, but there was no mandatory quarantining in a hotel yet. I think it came in about three or four days after we arrived and we were in that process of isolation when I started getting a little bit sick and I thought this is weird. So I went to get the test for COVID and it was positive. It came out positive, so yeah. So I thought you know this is bad, you know the illness took over, but it was actually I expected something worse, because you know we've heard so much about it yes, you know, we've heard so much about it. And I did get fevers and nausea in the end and headache, but nothing life-threatening. I didn't feel that my life was. There was only one time when I actually lost a little bit of faith, because it was when the nausea started. But I rang the doctor and the doctor said we won't admit you to the hospital because you, basically what you'll be doing here is the same that you're doing at home.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 5:33

So, yeah, so the other thing that was frustrating was that my daughter was there with me and I had to interact with her, even though I had a mask and everything, but it's easier to for the virus to be contagious, and so I asked my sister to take her away, and then they had to be for two weeks in quarantine and I continued being sick. But, like I said, I could watch TV, I could cook for myself, I could, you know, have showers and all of that. I had energy to do that, but every night, you know, there was the battle of fevers and that, but never respiratory problems. Anyway, after that finish, I was declared fine and then I went to my parents, because my parents live in.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 6:35

All of this was happening in Brisbane, and then, from Brisbane, we had to start the other thing of trying to get into New Zealand where my wife and my other daughter, and it took quite a while actually. We had to get in touch with a member of parliament to intervene for us and in the end, after three weeks, I got the, the visa. So I went there with my daughter, stayed two weeks in quarantine and then we finally met on the 1st of June. This is after, you know. We thought that it was going to. We were living on the 22nd of March and we thought we were going to see each other the next day, but yeah, it took that long. And then coming back, of course, because I knew I had to come back to teach.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 7:22

And then coming back of course, because I knew I had to come back to teach. They said, oh, if you leave, your status as resident no longer applies. You have to apply, and I really didn't want to do that, so, yeah. So I applied for multiple entry visa, which they granted just one week before I came here, entry visa, which they granted just one week before I came here. So for me, the best thing that happened was, you know, having arrived here and starting classes, but frustrating, I guess, in the sense that you know I came here and the COVID was the. The infection levels here were higher than in New Zealand. Yes, so I thought this is really frustrating. I've done all this effort to come to a country that actually, you know it's more likely that I'm going to get reinfected here than where I was, but nothing's happened so far. And you know I'm quite happy to be with the students. Teaching online for a whole semester is quite tiring and is not conducive to students being social and learning the possibilities.

Fatimah Abbouchi 8:42

Yeah, absolutely. Wow, that sounds like an absolute marathon of events to actually get you back to New Zealand. And how many months was it before you saw your wife and your other daughter?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 8:56

Well, march, we're talking the whole of April, the whole of May, so two months and a week. So that's what? Nine weeks? Yes, nine weeks. And the idea well, extra, yeah, but because she left on the 3rd of January. So plus five months.

Fatimah Abbouchi 9:30

Wow, that's incredible. January so plus to be past five months. I think a couple of things that you know as to point out, like, obviously you know, you and I spoke in your daughter's a teenager she fortunately didn't get it even though she was traveling with you the entire time, so that's quite remarkable and positive to hear. And then, obviously, spending some time in Australia. You going through from one quarantine to another must have been exhausting. How did you maintain, I guess, your resilience to go through that, from the journey leaving Denmark, through all of the travel back to Australia, back to New Zealand, how did you sort of remain strong and keep your spirits high?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 10:08

How did you sort of remain strong and keep your spirits high? Well, many things, you know keeping my support networks. Talking to friends, I actually made it public, you know, the fact that I had COVID, so I put on the, you know, on my Facebook page. You know I have been tested positive and you know people started to pour their sympathies and we, you know, a lot of people took the opportunity then to ring me People that I haven't talked to for years, or people that all the people were, you know, really, really, that had only seen me like a few days before. They wanted to know how I was. They wanted to know how it was.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 10:46

So, activating support networks, reading correct information because, as you know, there is a lot of misinformation regarding COVID, and so I made sure that I was reading, you know, scientific information and nothing coming out of social media, because it's the kind of news you get. They are very, very disheartening, and so what happens when you hear those sorts of news is that you get sad or you get angry, or you know all those states that are not conducive to well-being. So I tried to focus on, you know, information that was reliable. Also, I mean, you know, trying to continue life as possible. So in my line of work it's a very solitary thing, so I was able to focus a lot on reading and doing things that I don't have time for when I'm busy teaching, for instance, and also, I think William, my daughter, was with me, so there's always a sense of responsibility. So I have to think I need to stay strong despite the, and I need to present the situation as manageable, you know, so that my daughter doesn't feel that the whole world is falling apart. And I don't know if you've ever seen that movie, life is Beautiful, where the father is actually explaining to his son, you know, all these things in a way that he can understand, even though really the world was collapsing around him, and even to the last minute. Wow. So, yeah, the other thing I think is that I, you know, I have an attitude in life that I cannot be entitled. I mean, I'm not entitled. I like to think that I'm not an entitled person.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 13:12

So bad things can happen and, you know, the world at that time was closing borders, governments were closing borders, a lot of people were getting sick, lots of disturbance, you know, and what have you, and so for me to be traveling at that time it actually was a luxury. You know I could have stayed home, but we wanted to go ahead with the plans, but it was risky. So we knew already that you know, there were risks involved and so when we got to the airport I thought, okay, so this is something that we were not expecting, but it was possible. Let's see now how, what you know now, what is the next step. So we took it a bit at a time, finally got to Australia and then heard the news about the COVID and then again, I mean I was taking it day by day. Fortunately the nurses were ringing me every day and asking me.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 14:20

So focusing on these things and not thinking that, oh you know, I don't deserve to be sick, I'm actually getting. Anything can happen in life, so you just have to deal with it. Deal with the circumstances as they arise. Yeah, absolutely.

Fatimah Abbouchi 14:42

And controlling what you can, and focusing on what you can control and not what you can't control.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 14:48

That's right, yeah, yeah, I mean, you know my body was fighting a disease. It was doing its thing. All I had to do was just provide the best circumstances for that, for it to happen. So not getting too worried, eating well, you know, doing the things that I could do. So, yeah, a mixture of things, you know, and fortunately I don't think you know, with this virus being so new that I don't think I have any side effects. But you know, we don't know. So it remains to be seen whether there's any long-term problems, but so far I feel good, like even by the time that I was in quarantine in New Zealand. So almost what? Four weeks, no, sorry, three weeks after having been discharged, I was already exercising, you know, in the hotel room because I was thinking it's time to start being active and physically getting better. So it's been getting better ever since yeah.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 16:03

Amazing. That's really good.

Fatimah Abbouchi 16:04

It's a really positive story and it's been getting better ever since, yeah, amazing, that's really good, it's a really positive story and it's good to see um the resilience and, like I said, I think when you have children and that life is beautiful. I'll put that in the show notes um is a really um is a really good example of you know being strong for, for your children. So, um, that's amazing. Now I think it would be great to delve a bit deeper into your sort of what you thought you were going to be when you grew up, when you were younger. I know you were doing a lot of work, you know in the academia world and microfinance and natural resources and economic diversification and so many different things and I want to touch on all of those. But I want to know, when you think back to your sort of younger days, did you know that you wanted to be a professor? Did you know what your career was going to be? When did you sort of know what you wanted to do and how did that come about growing up?

Life Interrupted by Civil War

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 16:56

Well, I would say, you know, I think some people have a very strategic way of thinking about their career and they can plan ahead for I don't know, five years at a time, or even 10 years at a time. They say I want to be such and such. You know, by this I've been more opportunistic in that sense, in you know. In that sense, you know, just grab the opportunities as they come. I knew when I was a kid that I wanted to study at university and I was fascinated by electronics. So I wanted to be an electronic engineer. You know I wanted to be at one stage and then I decided that I wanted to be a car designer. Okay, yeah, I love cars and that.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 17:55

But then the war happened, because, you know, I'm from El Salvador and we had a civil war from 1980 to 1992. I was in 1979 when all these thoughts about what I wanted to do in life were happening. I was what 14, and the war started. It wasn't all of a sudden, it was actually a slow process, it had started since 1977, you know. And my parents, of course, were part of the resistance. So we were deeply implicated in, you know, fighting against the government. So it didn't take very long for us to realize. I mean, my parents decided to take us, to put us out of danger. So they took us to Costa Rica and they remain in El Salvador, because they thought that the war was going to finish soon and that didn't happen. So six months later they were with us in Costa Rica and we were there as refugees. So you know, we couldn't go back. We had political reasons not to, we had fear of our lives, and so we were there as refugees.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 19:31

But then we decided that my dad decided that it was going to be better to join all the members of the family who were going to the US. And so we went to the US. We did this illegally because there was no way we could get papers to travel to the US legally. So we did that and we arrived in Houston. You know, we met our rest of the family, not my mom and my mom my mom remained in Costa Rica but cousins, lots of cousins you know about my age or a little bit older. They were all there, you know, to escape the war and they were looking for jobs and that sort of thing.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 20:12

And so I started. I started working, but I also entered the school. You know, one of the schools there, one of them, and that kind of derailed my plans of being, you know, in engineering or that sort of thing. Because when I was doing mathematics in still in Costa Rica, I was like the best student, one of the best students, that would. My one of my good friends and myself were the best students in the class in mathematics, in physics, in chemistry.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 20:51

But when I got to the US it was such a different system that I lost the you know the. You know how they in mathematics they teach you certain things and then you jump into more complex things. Well, when I went to the US it was, you know, they've done so many other things that I completely lost the continuum. So I remember going to this class in algebra and I had done algebra in the last year in Costa Rica, but by the time I was, they were doing things that I couldn't understand. So my grades were not so good in that. But I did well in things like Spanish, spanish language, you know, because I could speak it. I wonder why? Yeah, physical education I could do well, what else? Because, you know, I didn't speak English. I had to learn. So I was doing English as a second language. Geography I did well. History I did more or less All these social science subjects I did relatively well. So you know, in the class of when we graduated there was a class of 465 students.

Academic Journey and Travel Adventures

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 22:13

This is the senior year I came up as I think it was 300. You know, I was ranked 300. And I thought, okay, so this is not the best. Of course I'm kind of a little bit more. You know, I was ranked three hundred and I thought, ok, so this is not the best. Of course I'm kind of a little bit more than a little bit better than the middle. But I also thought I'm not the worst because you know there were students there who spoke perfect English, you know, and all of that, and they were like you know number sorry, I'm counting so one is the worst and 465 was the best. So 300 is kind of closer to 400 than you know it is to one. So number one is the worst. And there were students there who spoke English who you know they obviously came from, they didn't want to be there or they came from really poor backgrounds, you know, not suited to school, and so many of them did, you know, really poorly and I thought that, you know, for somebody who didn't speak the language so well, coming 300 was a good achievement, that's what I thought to myself. But also it smashed these dreams of wanting to do things in engineering. So what happened then is that I went back to Costa Rica because my parents by then were applying for refugee status in Canada, and that was so I went back, but the application was rejected.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 23:59

Then we applied for Australia and Australia accepted us in September 1984. So we went there to Melbourne and then I thought, okay, I better start studying so I can get into university. And I did that and after many attempts and studying English, I finally made it in 1987 to Griffith University in in Brisbane, because we moved, you know, from Melbourne to Brisbane and so I was able to to make make it. But in the undergraduate course that I took was Asian Studies, and I, my one of my friends, explained this to me. He said oh, you know, this kind of studies will help you do. It's a generalist degree. You have to study a lot of politics and which I was fascinated by, and, and and and. Then you may be able to work in, you know, with the foreign service, with the civil service, with companies doing trading, you may be able to find a job overseas. You know, all things that I really liked as well, really liked as well.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 25:30

But by that stage, you know, my interest in electronics and engineering were slowly subsiding and I was much more into the social sciences. So I used to spend a lot of time. You know, I was one of those nerds who would go to the library after class and just sit there and read, read whatever book came, you know, close by. So you know, of course there was the reading list, but then I'd be reading all the things as well. You know, friday afternoon was the best time because I feel oh, you know this very quiet here in the library, and so I would just go there and just consume, you know, all these books.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 26:13

And also I could feel that in class my experience, having come from a country that was torn by a civil war, was perfect. You know, I could speak about the breakdown of democracy. I could speak about because a lot of students in Australia thought that, you know, democracy is basically so strong and could never, you know it's infallible. But of course that's not the case. You know, having come from a country like that, you can see it can break down.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 26:47

Then things like the rise of dictatorships, how a dictatorship governs, how it controls people, how it's managed to control ideology and that sort of thing and how people react. Basically, some of them, a lot of people, just continue their daily lives. So a whole lot of things. For me, I had lived those things and by reading about it in books, it was almost like confirming the things that I had lived. So I started and, of course, the other thing that I also realized is that many of these problems were related about many things. One is the position of, say, central America in the world, it's a peripheral place, it's not part of the center, the core of the world in terms of economics, in terms of politics, in terms of culture.

Fatimah Abbouchi 28:12

So I don't know if you remember about a year ago, when Trump said you know, these countries are in the arsehole of the world.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 28:15

I can forget that one, yeah, yeah. So I mean he said you know El Salvador, haiti and, of course, doing his wisdom, the country of Africa. You know, for him, africa is a country there's something like 30 plus countries there but the country of Africa and of course these are peripheral countries, they're very far away from places of importance, but what really incidents a lot of people is not the fact that's actually true, but the fact that he said it. Yeah, because when say, for instance, somebody from those parts of the world say, you know, we don't matter that much or we're very far away from these centers of power, we're saying it but we know the reasons, whereas when he was saying it, basically he was blaming somebody but at the same time, taking advantage of the situation, which is that, you know, for many years, there were people in these countries who wanted to, you know, who wanted to improve their situation, and then the US basically sent troops or advisors to try to stop these attempts at improving. You know the situation.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 29:42

So it's not very nice to be saying, oh, you are in that situation when you know that in the past, you know, the US government foreign policy has basically actively done things to mitigate these countries from, you know, improving themselves and it's something that happens to now. I mean, you know the whole situation about the caravans. You know the hundreds of people who leave from Central America into the US and end up some end up in jail, some end up with their kids being taken away and that sort of thing. So it's. You know it's a very complex relationship and one that you can't just say, oh, you know these countries are.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 30:35

I would have been more careful and said you know, these countries are in that, but the conditions in which they are in, they cannot escape the conditions in which they're in. You know something like that. But no, oh, they're in the ass of the world and they deserve it Almost. It sounded almost like that. Anyway, the thing is that I was. I thought you know that the best way for me to understand this situation one is just politics, but also the economics of things and try to understand how, for instance, countries developed, how they become, how they improve.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 31:17

And I thought that doing Asian Studies was a good thing because at the time, as you know, there were countries like Singapore, like Taiwan, like Hong Kong, that were moving very quickly towards what we call now, you know, development, so improving their situation, you know, in the world stage and becoming basically creating better opportunities for their citizens. And so, you know, I was also fascinated by Japan, you know, and how they did they've done, as you know. Their position in the world is important Now, after you know, in the first two centuries ago they were basically a poor country, and look where they are now, whereas Latin America gained independence around the same time and was never able to gain that position of prominence. So for me, that was also interesting to study and to see what were the things that made certain countries work better than others. And also, what is it about the world economy that maintains this idea of countries that are core to the system and countries that are peripheral or even marginalized in that system? Yeah, countries that are peripheral or even marginalized, you know, in that system, yeah. So I did study political economy, I finished my undergraduate and then I went to Japan to work, came back, did honors and then did my PhD.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 33:04

I finished in 2003 and I was so lucky that I was like, a few months before finishing my PhD, a colleague of mine called me from University of the South Pacific and said there is a job here for six months to cover for somebody. Do you want to take it? So I said yes. I finished with PhD on the 28th of June 2003, and on the 4th of July of the same year I was in Fiji. So I don't know if you can see the thread here, but I actually didn't think that it was going to. You know, I did want to study. I was passionate about, you know, studying these things.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 33:49

But each of these steps I didn't like. I didn't know I was going to do a PhD. When I went to Japan I didn't know. I knew that I wanted to do more than a graduate degree because I wanted to find out more, and then the graduate degree because I wanted to find out more. So I did my. What do they call it? The master's, not the master's? In Australia they have this year that is called honors, honors, yep, honors years, which basically prepares you for either a master's or a PhD and I did really well. But before you know, as I finished this Honors year, I actually didn't go straight to study. I really wanted to travel the world and I wanted to travel by bicycle, so I embarked on a tour from Brisbane to India by bicycle.

Fatimah Abbouchi 35:00

What?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 35:00

Yeah, I need to know how that happened All right, okay, yeah, so I took off from Brisbane with my panniers and everything and I traveled all the way to Darwin, and then from Darwin I jumped on a plane to Timor and then to Indonesia and then Singapore, and by that stage it had been eight months of travel and I was sick of traveling. By that stage I was like I don't want to meet another person who will ask me about my life and and I I went some familiarity, so I didn't get made it to India, uh. But so I came back to Australia. But, um, it was. You know, it was a an amazing trip and and I'm still when I find the time again to do it something crazy like that, but it was, it was nice maybe a little bit, a little bit further down the track when the COVID pandemic comes down and we can open some borders.

Fatimah Abbouchi 35:57

Okay, I have so many questions for you now.

Fatimah Abbouchi 35:59

You've just given so much good information that I don't think anyone really knows, and I love the fact that you've taken your lived experiences and, as you mentioned at the beginning, opportunistic situations around where you've gotten to today by going down that path, as opposed to what some of us struggle with is having a predetermined view of what's the next five years or 10 years or what do I want to be, what do I want to do.

Fatimah Abbouchi 36:23

So I love that and I think it's incredible that you've now taken that educational academic journey and then, uh, if I recall correctly, you ended up going into the consulting space where you you did some consulting work with Worley Parsons, a really giant global consulting firm. How did, how did you find that working, taking, taking all the academia that you'd learned from and then going into consulting, and then now you're back in academia, academia land. How was that experience in the consulting world and how do you feel that you were able to leverage the uh, the knowledge, um that you'd learned in your, in your um studies to actually then apply that with that consulting firm yeah.

Resource-Dependent Economies and Economic Diversification

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 37:03

So it was actually because I think I told you, the last thing I did was, you know, worked in Fiji in academia, came back to Australia and I worked for a foundation, a research foundation, and a lot of the work we were doing there was a little bit, you know, consulting but also doing research. You know it was not a university, it was more applied research, you know, for these companies or for projects and things like that. So that kind of prepared me a little bit. Then I did a stint at the Center for Social Responsibility in Mining at the University of Queensland and again, you know, doing quite a fair bit of work in doing research, applied research into basically projects that were consulting projects. So the companies wanted us to do a study.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 38:02

For instance, this mining company wanted an economic study of Ligure, you know, the mine that they own there in Papua New Guinea. So I had already, I guess, prepared a little bit. Of course I didn't know it at the time that this was happening, but when I went into this consulting company they were interested in the fact that I had worked with the resources sector and we were in the social team, the social compliance team, him, and I have to admit it was a little bit confronting at the beginning because I had never had to work, for instance, in terms of time, with time being measured against you.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 39:04

So you have two hours to do this job, every hour had to be accounted for for a particular budget. You know, that was a little bit shocking to me because I thought, well, I have to do this very quick. And I realized then that, you know, whereas in academia we spend a lot of time making sure that all the details are right, and time is basically it's not unlimited, but it is it's more time In this company we just had to get the staff. It wasn't about detail, it was about trying to get the best details within the best within the time that what you were given. So you know work quicker and also in different directions. So again, you know, in academia you can spend a whole lot of time analyzing one particular issue for a very long time, whereas here, you know one hour you'd be working on getting statistics for. You know, particular mine. Another time it'll be, you know, contacting suppliers. You know, because of the of the, the community relations teams wanted to know, you know what kind of contracts they had that would impact on the community. You know things like that. So it was very, very, very different.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 40:45

Perhaps the the one thing about Worley Parsage is that it's such a huge company that I you know I was working in a small team and I felt that I was, you know, a very small cog in a huge machine, a very small cog in a huge machine, whereas I worked in other places where you know your work is much more connected with not just with your clients, but also with your other colleagues, the working in big companies. Feeling is, and, like I said, even though our team was only eight people, you know the social team, but still I felt that we were very small in this huge machine. That was the company, that was so it being. You know you had to be efficient, you had to be very flexible, you had to work with people that didn't have any clue about, you know, social problems.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 41:57

So most of the people were engineers and scientists and a lot of times you had to explain to them in language they could understand, usually, numbers, you know you had the things that were happening, you know on the ground, so that that, so they could make decisions and again, that's a skill that is very important to have because we are trained. You know our training, academic training, our disciplinary training, really matters. So if you are an engineer or a medical doctor, or you an accountant, they, they, you know, they understand. The view they have is, from a particular perspective, independent of whatever else they think you know in in terms of their, their ideology or what have you but they, you also have that you have to take into account that we have been trained differently and we speak different jargons.

Fatimah Abbouchi 43:15

Yes, absolutely. I'm interested to know. You've done quite a bit in the resources space and obviously you've worked with and in different resource-dependent countries. Can you help our listeners understand what is a resource-dependent countries? Can you help our listeners understand what is a resource-dependent country? And then I want to understand a little bit more about one of your recently co-authored reports called the Analysis of Economic and Social Effects of Pueblo Viejo Mining Project. So you've done a lot in the resource sector. First of all, what is a resource-dependent country and why does having natural resource wealth lead to poor macroeconomic stability? Can you tell us a little bit more about that?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 43:55

Yeah, so a resource dependent country is one whose economy depends much more on the resources sector than some other countries. So when you divide the economy into primary, secondary, or if you look at, say, the economic sectors as mining, construction, agriculture, manufacturing, tourism, education, all this and the mining, for instance, or resource extraction, I think the World Bank says if your economy is more than 15 percent, if your GDP is more than 15% of your GDP, then you have an economy that is dependent on natural resources. So it's problematic. Any country that relies on one single type of economic activity is much more susceptible to shocks from the outside, or even from the inside. So you can see now, for instance, in terms of tourism, and you have a lot of countries, say, in the South Pacific or somebody was telling me about Thailand, for instance whose economies rely quite heavily on tourism. With the onset of COVID, they are in real trouble, you know, because they relied a lot on that. So it's exactly the same thing with natural resources.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 45:56

The countries that rely a lot on these commodities can be susceptible to changes, and it's not just shocks like, for instance, big recessions, like what we had in 2008, but it's an annual thing. So these commodities have a price in the international market and these prices are not stable. They they're very volatile, they go up and down. So what happens is that, for instance, with Australia, yet the the commodities boom, you know, from around the beginning of the year 2000 and up until 2008, you know a lot of money was coming in as generated by things like iron ore, coal, and you know all of these commodities. That was good for the mining sector and parts of the economy, but it meant that the value, the currency, started to pick up on value and it then crowds out all the sectors so that, for instance, you know, if the Australian dollar is high, then people decide not to study in Australia or not to go to Australia for tourism because it's not going to. Whatever currency they're using is not going to be favorably exchanged to a high Australian dollar, so they may decide to go somewhere else.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 47:48

And so, you know, usually we think, oh, you know, the the more, the merrier. But it doesn't happen like that, it's. It's actually the more of one type of economy will displace the others, and and so it is always better to have, you know, a very diversified economy. In Australia, city centres or the urban centres are quite diversified, but as you travel to the countryside and the regional areas, they become less so. And the government, you know, despite it trying, you know various types of diversification.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 48:29

I think the problem is that the economy that we're linked into doesn't allow for much government intervention. So the last 30 years we've had this idea that the markets should be more, there should be deciding factors, they should be free, and so basically what happens with a lot of regions in Australia is that they have to compete with the world, basically all the regions in the world, and with very little government intervention or very little, with no protection from the state, you know, to protect them against those currents. So, you know, regions in Australia have to compete with, say, regions in Thailand, in China, in various other parts of the world, and because of the waste structure, then you know, we almost know who's going to win in that race. Unfortunately, what they thought as well is, oh, we're going to be moving away from, say, manufacturing and labor-intensive activities towards more labor-intensive activities, towards more smart industries. You know, the problem with that is that it requires a lot of training.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 50:25

It requires highly skilled labor and the universities in Australia are able to provide that, but not everybody is able. Despite the fact that Australian academic system has very little barriers, you know, for people to go in. It's not like the US system where you actually have to pay up front, you know, really high sums to be able to get into a university, to get training, to be able to work in this industry. Australia doesn't have that, are not in the, are not this high skill. You know very brainy type of jobs. You know they do manual labor and it's not a very insignificant part of the population that is engaged in these things.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 51:24

So basically, what happens is that these people are left behind, you know, by this new approach and so you create this you know this much more this society and this economy that is much more hierarchical than it was, say, you know, 40, 50 years ago than it was, say, 40, 50 years ago. So this is one of the reasons why economic diversification is a good thing is you need to have enough different industries that cater for different skill sets and we cannot expect everybody to be going to universities and to learn highly skilled skills that require a lot of mathematics, for instance, or things like that. Not everybody's going to be able to do that. So, yes, we need those things to remain competitive, but we also need the manual labor and in some respects also we also need to protect some parts of the market because they are not strong enough to compete with regions in other parts of the world.

Fatimah Abbouchi 52:51

You know, um, um, yeah do you think, do you think that um the sort of the effects of, of, you know, the lack of economic diversification and and some of these challenges? Are they unique in the sense that it depends on the sort of the leadership of the country, or are you seeing this sort of stuff universally?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 53:12

It's a universal problem because, you know, from the 80s onwards, countries basically abandoned this Keynesian approach to economic management. So, instead of having a very strong government, a very large government, a large state that would intervene in the economy and protect it and, you know, be part of the economy as well. I don't know if you remember a few years ago, telstra was government-owned, so was Quanta, so was many, many companies. They were government-owned. This was an attempt by government to be able to set rules and standards in relation to certain markets.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 54:06

That kind of wisdom was replaced by the neoliberal approach, which basically means, you know, governments, the states, should not be big. They should be just large enough to secure safety of citizens and of the private sector and a succession of governments in, always, democracy, and to create the conditions for the private industry to thrive so that they can provide employment to everybody, industry to thrive, so that they can provide employment to everybody. And what we actually see is that, instead of providing more employment, they provide less, because firms are not about providing employment as a welfare thing, they're about becoming efficient, yeah, yeah. In other words, producing more with less resources, and labor is one resource. So, if you can, for instance in supermarkets.

Fatimah Abbouchi 55:20

If you can replace checkout people for robots, then of course you're going to have these automated ones, because they mean less cost in the supermarket many, many years ago where they started talking about I was working retail and and they were talking about doing and we were all shocked about it. Now it's the norm in most supermarkets.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 55:46

Yeah. So that's a logical conclusion of you know the in other countries. When you asked me whether this was a universal thing, I said yes, but in actual fact there's variations. So the United States, the English-speaking countries like the United States, new Zealand, australia, canada, the UK, are kind of at the forefront of this because of the cultural similarities, because of language similarity, but also because of the way they govern. So countries in continental Europe, especially Germany and France, they haven't followed that line of thinking so so zealously. They are a little bit more cautious. And Japan is the same, the same thing. So they still remain very, their states remain very strong, and and so some of the things haven't happened.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 57:03

So here in Denmark, for instance, automatic checkout are a rarity, and the reason why it is is because, well, partly because we still have strong unions that have prevented the wholesale, the retail monopoly. There's a duopoly here, but they prevented that from happening. They said no, you still have to provide jobs, despite the fact that we have the technology. And so it's a political decision that has been made, a political compromise between the one hand, you know unions and employers and said you know, there is a technology out there that will save money. But the most important thing is to maintain jobs, you know, for these people. So they're being able to do it and you know, I don't think, I don't feel that things here are worse than Australia. They actually Denmark is one of the most productive countries in the world, you know, according to the OECD, much more than Australia actually.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 58:22

So how do they do that? Much more than Australia actually? So how do they do that? You know, when they don't, they're not following these ideas about. You know the market will solve all problems. I think they're able to do it because they are more careful about what it means. So it's more common in places like Australia and the US and the UK, but less common in continental Europe and Japan, and then in the developing world, but less common in continental Europe and Japan. And then, you know, in the developing world there's varieties, you know. So again, yeah, so, but definitely has been a change, a shift, you know, from the years in the 60s and 70s, when the state was really big, to what we have now, and I think that you know that has created a world that has become much more susceptible to shocks. So we've seen, you know, quite a number of recessions in the last few years. The worst was, of course, the one happening in 2008, the global financial crisis. But what we're dealing with now, this is the first, I would say, virus-led recession.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:00:03

It's serious as well, and we can see how vulnerable we are, and I still don't hear governments or political parties coming up with radically different ideas about how we should govern our economies. They are still thinking well, let's, you know, we're waiting for a vaccine or something to come up and then we'll get back to normality. Well, that normality actually is very, very susceptible to shocks. Why don't we do something to strengthen and to make these economies more, make these economies more stable and, you know, sustainable over the long term? Why do we want to go back to a system that is so vulnerable to whatever happens outside? You know when we could do something better, but I haven't seen a single party. You know, in Europe, in Australia, New Zealand is about to have an election, the US is about to have an election. I haven't, you know, seen anybody saying anything to that effect. In actual fact, everybody's just going. We'll have more of the same.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:01:36

So yeah, the COVID new, covid normal, the post you know, post COVID normal, and it's a lack of, possibly around lack of accountability. Maybe that there needs to be more to keep governments and public sector accountable in this space.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:01:49

Yes, that's right. Yeah, yes, so that is yeah. So that's what I think in relation to you. Know, I don't know if I answered your question, but no, no you definitely did.

Global Governance and International Agreements

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:02:01

I think it's. Yeah, I think it's really interesting and I like how you talk about the fact that you know it really does differ by you know, by different country and regions and whatnot. I think it's right. There is definitely some work that needs to be done in that space and definitely there needs to be more accountability. And I guess, speaking of accountability, I know that you also do a lot in the international governance space. Now, that's the governance is sort of the way that we connected with Aarhus University and we'll probably talk about that in a moment. I'm really interested in sharing more with our listeners around what is governance? There's so much lack of understanding and misunderstandings around what governance is and what does it mean. I think it's really misunderstood, particularly even in the sort of the world that I'm in, the project management world. You hear the word governance and you're just thinking you know process, police and all of these sort of negative connotations. But governance is really important. So I'm interested to know a little bit more from your perspective. What is international governance? As a starting point?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:03:10

Yeah. So international governance or global governance, is a particular type of governance where we have, for instance, you know, international bodies such as the OECD. You know the World Trade Organization, the WHO at the moment, you moment the World Health Organization. There's quite a number of them, and they're all dealing with issues of not governing because they don't have the power to govern, but they set out rules by which everybody well, not everybody most countries abide by. And one thing that should be clear is that all of these organizations, countries gain membership, they apply for membership, they gain membership and, of course, then they comply, they ratify many of the agreements. Nobody does things without having ratified them. In other words, nobody is there, no country is there against their will, against their will, all of them are. And if you don't like it, then you can leave. For instance, the US has just left the World Health Organization, and the same applies for many of the international organizations. Not all countries are members. Some are. They have different status, like visiting or observer status, some are full members and what have you. But by and large, most of them are in one or another international organization. I'll just give you one little example that I know from. You know, there's a body called the Universal Postal Union. The Universal Postal Union was created in the 18th century and you know it's continued on. This is what sets the rules for basically the post you know that we still use.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:05:43

After World War II they decided that to help countries in the developing world. You know, because you had all of these independent countries, that they were going to charge a discounted rate. You know, for people to post letters, say, and parcels from these countries to other countries, so you you pay relatively less. You know, for a letter or a parcel if it's coming out of, say, el Salvador than if it's coming out of Australia, relatively, I mean it's. You know a letter with one or two pages inside is almost nothing. You know weighs very little, but the cost I don't know how they subsidize it, but basically it's less.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:06:35

You know for developing countries To increase communication to be becoming oh sorry, I have to go back and say that the whole idea of this, of course, is to help not just these countries increase their communication capabilities, but also to help them develop, to progress their economies. So that's the main. Now fast forward to 2020, and you have China being a country that's grown a lot, that has developed the way that we believe that development should happen and the way that we believe that development should happen, but they still are under the Universal Postal Union's scheme of being able to use this discount. So what is happening now is you have companies, chinese companies, such as, I think, is it Weibo or what's the other company?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:07:50

yeah there's, yeah, there is another company, that, um, where you can actually shop for things, um, and they all come from alibaba. Yes, alibaba, you know many of these companies. It is actually very cheap to buy from those places because the rates are cheap. You know, the sending rates are cheap. It allows these companies to do that because there is an agreement between all countries that this is going to be the case. Now many countries like the United States are saying, oh, this is not a good idea anymore. Or, you know, it is more expensive for somebody, say, in California, to send a parcel to Florida than it is to get it from China. So, I mean, this proves a couple of things. One is, yeah, it is true, and of course the Chinese are taking advantage of this situation. But wasn't it supposed to be that way? The whole idea was that you do these things so that they could then compete. Now they're competing.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:09:03

Yes, I don't like it. I don't like that. Yes, what have I produced? You know, I don't like it. I don't like that name. Uh-oh, yes, where have I produced, you know, a monster. So, and this happens all the time. So what they're doing, of course, in the Universal Postal Union is one vote for. You know, and most countries in the global south what we call are saying no, we like this system. China is only one country. We still are poor. So you know, countries like El Salvador and you know so many other poor countries are saying no, this is fine, it's working fine. So you know, it is a governance, it's an agreement that has created a governance framework.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:09:53

Yeah, Exactly framework.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:09:56

Yeah, and there are hundreds of agreements and hundreds of things we do that are able to do in our everyday life as a result of this agreement. So you know, of course, we know the ones that occur at our, say, our council and our state level, and even Australian level or national level, but there are also a lot of agreements made at the international level, and some of them don't affect us personally, but others, do you know, do it. This is one you know. So international governance is related to that type of thing. You know what is the best way for these, not just for what is the best way to deal with situations that arise, and also the best way of dealing with, you know, issues such as disease, for instance. You know how do you. The seas, for instance, you know how do you. Okay, I'll give you one example. You know the whole thing with.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:11:19

You might remember a few years ago, with the deep water horizon in of the coast of Texas and how you know it was spewing oil and that, yeah, devastating to the environment, devastating to the environment. When they started to look into the actual, you know the government, the US government, wanted to know who owned the platform and you know they wanted to basically find out who was responsible for what you know. Because BP, to basically find out who was responsible for what you know? Because BP is a huge company and they do a lot of what they call as many other companies do. They do a lot of subcontracting. Well, okay, so we know that the backstops with BP.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:12:03

But let's have a look at who owns the platform. Well, the platform is actually rented. It's rented by a company that is registered in I think it was the Bahamas or someplace like that. Platforms are actually regarded in the low of the sea as ships and so they're registered. And what is happening in the law of the sea as ships and so they're registered, and what is happening in the in the shipping world now is that many of them are registered in the co-flexor convenience places like Panama, liberia. Why do they do that is because the tax rates are favorable. You can register quite easily. You don't have the same labor laws as, say, a country like Australia or the United States, and so this is one of the reasons why in those ships you see a lot of Filipinos, you know sailors and also people from Kiribati, people from developing countries. You know the actual labor laws are very weak. Basically, think about it this way you rent out a car that is not registered. You know in the country that you are using it.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:13:25

It's registered an african country that has a very little, uh, you know very few rules about safety and health, but you're driving the car, say, in australia, yeah, um, and what happens when you have an accident in it?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:13:40

so it's a similar thing that happened here. You know the, the, the platform is actually rented out by a company that runs the business from one of these Flux of Convenience locations. So not only that. Then they started going okay, so that's okay, we'll find. You know, we'll find who the owner is. They found it. Then, okay, who designed this? Is they found it? Then, okay, who designed this? Because they said it was a design problem. So, yes, of course I think Hyundai had made it, but it was, like I said, owned by someone else. Yeah, it was very difficult for the US government, the courts, to try to find out some kind of you know, because you want to find these situations, you want to find out who is liable.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:14:35

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:14:37

But the governance of this area of the economy is so weak and full of holes that it was very difficult to blade them. I mean, in the end, bp of course had to front up, but when, of course, they were blaming the subcontractor and the subcontractor were blaming the person that, oh, but we rented out from here and then came the designers and all that.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:15:16

All of that. So it it was. It's a nightmare, and so this is. Those are the sorts of things that international governance is trying to avoid. You know, people, we want to create a kind of world that is much more accountable and that is much more that that. You know how things are going to occur. You know if something goes wrong.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:15:41

Yeah, you need it when you need it when something is preventative maintenance, so you need it when it goes wrong. It when something is preventative maintenance, so you need it when it goes wrong. It's it's sort of like you mentioned framework, it's it's having those guardrails in place up front. Everyone knows the accountabilities and then if something does go horribly wrong, as with deep water horizons situation um, not only do you have the visibility of the accountabilities, but you can also trace, trace back where the fault was or where the challenge was, or where the hurdle was, so that you can rectify it, so it doesn't happen again.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:16:15

Yeah, yes, yes, so I mean, but of course governance means different things. This is we're talking about international governance, you know, and we're talking about, you know, big, big bodies. But what about, for instance, in within companies and within even you know, countries or small units of organization? So let me quote you. There's a guy. This is Baruch the Spinoza or Benedictus the Spinoza, you know, depending on Baruch is the Jewish name and Benedictus is the Latin name.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:16:57

The Spinoza was one of the Spinoza D-E.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:17:02

Well is Baruch, so B-A-R-U-C-K or B-A, sorry B-A-R-U-C-H.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:17:13

R-U-C-H. Yeah.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:17:13

Yeah, de Espinosa D-E and Espinosa is S-P-I-N-O-C-H. Okay, so this is an important philosopher, a Dutch philosopher. In 1677 he wrote a book called the Political Treaties of the Dutch Reform Church, interfering into the then Dutch government's very open policy and very tolerant policy towards other religions. They didn't like that. Anyway, there's been also being Jewish from background, portuguese background. You know.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:18:24

He felt that this was an affront and a threat to not just a Jewish community but all the communities there, decided to write this book, which basically this considers you know, one of the one of the no, not the founding ideas, but a contributor to this idea of a strong democratic thinking.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:18:55

You know, at that time he said so in these political treaties. He said men should be governed in such a way that they do not regard themselves as being governed. And so he basically was saying you know, we should be easy on the government. You know, the government shouldn't be dictating to people they should regard as being governed but as following their own bent and their own free choice in their manner of life. So basically, this sounds a lot like liberalism you do as you please, but you still govern in such a way then that they are restrained only by love of freedom, decide to increase their possessions and the hope of obtaining office of state. So basically, what he's saying is let's have a government, governmental system that allows these people to, that allows people to do all these things that they want to do, but we should still be able to govern them. In other words, we shouldn't interfere, we shouldn't be dictating. He could see that from the Dutch Reformed Church wanting to impose more constraints into what was then probably religious minorities.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:20:34

So, he wrote that book and it caused such an uproar that some of the critics said this book is forged in hell by the devil himself yes, so they didn't like him. This book is forged in hell by the devil himself yes, so they didn't like him. They didn't like him for saying that he was, and I mean he was also excommunicated from his own, you know, from the Jewish religion for saying all the things about God and that sort of thing, because he didn't believe in the ever-present God. He was more rationalist and he believed mostly about God as manifesting in certain things, which was completely against what the Jewish religion was then saying. But for this idea he was criticized. If you jump to now, to the current times, you well, no, let's not jump to the current time, but let's jump to late 1970s.

Effective Governance Through Self-Regulation

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:21:56

And Michel Foucault, you know a French philosopher, said that he decided to come up with the idea of governmentality. Governmentality is much broader than just government. It's about the way we conduct ourselves. And here he says one of the things is that there are many ways, mechanisms and rules that people and governments and organizations use to help us conduct ourselves. So for him, governance is about the conduct, of conduct. So it applies to everything. It applies not just to government, but it also applies to companies. And you know he says you, we. The most effective form of governing is when we ourselves internalize, you know the ways that the certain norms. Yeah, so, for instance, you know, we, in past people used to smoke and smoke publicly. Then, with a lot of campaigning from not just the government but also from NGOs and that, and health bodies, people, now it's not that they're listening to the government about not smoking, it's also because people themselves, you know, and the individual themselves are thinking you know, this is not good for me, so you internalize something that was a rule before and then you internalize it, and then this is I'm going to call the most effective way of governing, because you become your own regulator.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:24:10

I see it, for instance, in houses. In many places, people who smoke actually go outside their own homes if there are others who don't smoke, so they're self-regulating there. They're saying I don't want to, I can do it myself, but I don't want others to smoke, so they go outside. Another is time. Another example is time. So you don't need somebody to tell you that you have to be at a particular place, at work, for instance, on time. You carry a watch and you keep telling yourself you know I have to be there at a particular time. So these forms of governance actually shape us. They shape our conduct.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:25:01

Yeah, so it's a very powerful way of governing in a society such as what Espinosa was saying. You know, how do you ensure that everybody's more or less going in the same direction when everybody has so much freedom? You know Well, the best way of doing it is not by having a strong government, according to these people, yeah, yeah, is by having a system of governance. That that is, that is internalized. Yeah, so, for instance, for companies, you know we can talk about, say, ethics or corporate social responsibility the best way of governing is not of, of course, it always helps having a very charismatic leader and, you know, having all the frameworks and everything. But if you can get everybody to self-regulate within that company, then it's so much better, so much, then it's so much better, so much more effective than things coming from outside or from the top. So this is where Foucault brought about governmentality and this is how we can see governance in in companies.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:26:33

But, but there's only all the tips of government. This is, these are just two or one view, but there's many others. I mean this hierarchical governance is a governance that comes as a result of networks, governance as a result of communities, governance as a result of… what was the other one that I forget now, but it'll come but there's many different types and there is no agreement as to what is a governance. So it is a very it's a contested term, there is no agreement and this is why it may seem like confusing, because, oh yeah, I got it now. It's governance as markets. You know where. It's actually the market that provides the framework for governance the price of things. The price is everything. So don't be surprised that there is no agreement and people use it in different ways.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:27:46

But, for instance, if we take this idea of governmentality, then you would see that it actually makes sense for people to internalize things. But it is one way of governing, is not the only way. There's, there's others and I think that if you know the when, when you have, for instance, a piece of legislation, legislation is actually not a very good way of governing, because people break the rules all the time. Um, it may be, uh, you know, an ethical uh is is another way of, but it's also aspirational. So again, some people may not be not a heed to that. So the thing is, whatever type of governance you use, there's cost of ignoring it, whether your organization becomes inefficient or your organization, as in the case of you know, british Petroleum, runs into problems of accountability.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:29:17

Yeah.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:29:20

And also the other thing is that people themselves, you know within organizations, may find that, you know, this is not an organization, a good organization to work for, because they we've been told one thing but we're acting in a different way.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:29:36

So yes, and that goes back to the comment you make around the ethics, for example hmm, yes, yes, and and here is where I think the leadership is important, you know, to make sure that whatever type you use is then is followed through thing and then do another, because people can see that the way and then they could say is hypocrite or there's no alignment, you know, and all these things. So yeah, Okay. Yeah, so.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:30:26

Sorry.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:30:29

I was going to say to you that don't be surprised that there is such a. You know, different People are using governance in different contexts, in different ways, but I guess many at the beginning when this was created and I think that the Spinoza was trying, it was one way, one of the exponents, many of them they were talking about conducting oneself. Governance meant almost like a conduct, like ethical conduct, but then it became the realm of state officials and I think that it stayed like that until recently. So government or the act of governing, became kind of like the realm of politics, the realm of states, the realm of politicians. Now there's been a return to the original term, which is broader, and this is why I brought Foucault into the equation, because it's not just the realm of politics and the realm of the states, it's actually the realm of just about everybody.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:31:54

You know, in companies, government, individuals, and how we conduct ourselves has a very strong relationship to how we conduct ourselves, how companies conduct themselves. If you have a company that is led by somebody who is not ethical, that is led by somebody who is not ethical, I don't think you're going to be able to have an ethical company, even if everybody was ethical, but not the CEO. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Or the other way around. You know, when you have a very, let's say, a responsible person at the top, but nobody else and this happens in many governments you know where you bring in somebody who is very popular because everybody thinks that they, you know this person is clean, but the whole system is corrupt, you know, and so you get a talking head at the top. It's the same thing with companies. You know, if you have a company that is not working well, you know you may have a very good head leader or CEO at the top, but it will not last very long.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:33:18

Yeah, absolutely. You actually, you know, hit the nail on the head by talking about sort of key components being, you know, know, the framework is one thing and having some sort of framework to help guide people, the leadership is obviously really important. And then I think the the third part around self-regulation. I'm seeing that at the moment in in the sort of project management space, with some you know different ways of working in agile methodologies and things. So, going into the projects management space, which is kind of the next area I wanted to touch on, self-regulation is really good, but it just needs to be applied. People need to feel that they themselves, as you said, are conducting themselves in a manner that is in line with what the organisation you know aspires to, and following the leaders and whatnot. So it's interesting. Self-regulation is really important, but I don't know how effective it is. I think it varies as much as the different views on governance in general, would you say. Would you agree?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:34:17

Yes, yes, I mean. The thing is, you know, self-regulation assumes that we're up to a certain extent, that we're kind of logical, rational individuals who know what we want. But we're completely irrational and we may say we want something but we actually want something else. You know, we're completely, we're not. I wouldn't say we're irrational, but we're. You know, if we were rational, I don't think that we follow through very well. So that's one problem.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:35:05

The other thing is, I think, the mechanisms for the reward mechanisms.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:35:11

You know, in companies, in current modern organizations, contemporary organizations, you know, one of the most powerful ways of getting people to do work, the established way, is the income you know they're getting.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:35:36

But income is such a small part of people's lives, you know it is big in the sense that of course we rely on that to make a sleep. But in the value systems that we have, because there's so many, a lot of people, for a lot of people, it's not enough. So you have to find, you have to actually, I think, customize the reward system that you have for different workers, and you know how difficult that is. But the thing is that for some people, you know, the economic reward is only part of the equation. Then they want you know this more control, or it can be more responsibility or more recognition. There's different things that work you, and so I don't think that self-regulation works completely on its own. You have to have a reward system that accompanies it. You know, that is aligned as well with this, so that people become a little bit more conscious of you know, the reason why I'm doing this is because I can get recognized or what have you.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:37:10

Yeah.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:37:11

Yeah absolutely yeah, but I also think, like in terms of, you know, in terms of project management, I think that you know the other thing, and you already know this, I think we already know it is the whole communication and you know, just trying to be trying to get ideas across.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:37:41

That actually what you meant. You know, lack of communication, the you know it's a big problem and I think that if we can find, if we can create these systems that are conducive to good communication and again, here is where governance comes into the picture then things could be much, much better. But you know, there's hundreds of authors and books and stuff written on this. So I think that we can only just learn a little bit and hope for the best. Yeah, absolutely, we can't know everything that there is. So I guess perhaps the best thing is to be consistent, so that if you have a very strong governance in your own organization, governance in your own organization, something that you feel that is working well and aligned to your value system, your system of rewards, then at least you know that you're in a very strong position to then come to work with other people.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:39:08

The problem, of course, is okay, what about when we come across perhaps no ineffectual but non-functioning organizations? You know dysfunctional organizations, and there are those, yeah, yeah. So how do we do it? I mean, it's almost as if we have to take the, the position of the, the therapist, you know, because these organizations are dysfunctional, before we can do anything, we actually have to fix that, this functionality, or not fix it, but make them reflect about how dysfunctional the whole thing is.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:39:55

Especially the leadership team. We find quite a lot in the work that we do is it really is about talking to people, reviewing what's there, understanding where the challenges are and actually listening to them, because often the teams that work within these organisations underneath the leaders, you know are aware of the problems and the challenges and the things that they need to be successful. That's causing the dysfunctionality, but often the leadership team is quite helicopter view in organisations. They don't see it or they don't have the time to give it the attention it needs. So I think you're spot on. I think it's all about communication and making sure that you actually are talking to these people to understand what is the reason for the dysfunction and then trying to address it, and governance is a big part of that, I think, as well.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:40:44

Yes, yes, yes, so so, and we, we, you know, I mean it's it's not the work of the, of the consultant, but, like I said, you almost have to take that, that role.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:41:00

You know that role of I mean, I don't like saying therapist, but the role of the one who makes the client reflect about this functionality so that they can then do things to address it. Yeah, before you can even start working with them, because you know how do. How do you make that happen? How do you get a project going when the system is dysfunctional? Yeah, yeah. So that's one problem, of course, but I think that, in terms of, I think that you know there should be a cause or a. I mean, when you're working with a client, you're already in the fray, so it's, it's you have to do it as a kind of helping to reflect.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:42:09

But I think that maybe we could have a course on governance, a short course for people to understand how important this is, to raise awareness of the importance of governance and to examine it in its very broad form and also in its specific form, the way in which it affects us as workers in organizations. Yeah, so I think that you know something it's raising awareness of this issue can be a good thing, you know, towards addressing some of these problems. So that and and it should be, I think, not the rank and file, but actually some leaders and CEOs in companies that should learn, you know more about this, so that they are aware that this is important, and to be able for them to be able to recognise, you know, where they may be going wrong or where they can improve things.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:43:27

Yeah, absolutely, and we've talked about this a few times as well in the past and you know previous conversations and obviously we've done some work together at the university last year and things like that and it's definitely been a contentious topic because I think it is that lack of awareness. A lot of the time people don't realize they're actually missing this sort of information. That would really probably open up their eyes into what's going on in the organization. But I I guess they're just these executives are so busy with everything else that they're doing that maybe it's just not prioritized until, like we gave the example before, deep water horizon or something else. So that's all, maybe not as drastic goes wrong, and then that's where the the microscope comes out and and it's looking at where the problems are in that journey as well.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:44:14

So yeah, or it can be uh, expressed in other form, more um in. You know, perhaps not as big events such as that, but but it could be something chronic, like high turnover of people. You know you know good people come and then they leave. You know this is a problem. Yeah, so they definitely. I think you know we have been talking about it, you and I about this governance thing. You know we have been talking about it, you and I about this governance thing. But also perhaps you'd be mentioned, you know, our work that we did last year, because I think that I mean, it was perhaps a small example, but I think that it went in terms of governance, it went really well, but there was, of course, a lot of planning and when it was actually the relationship we had once we started to implement it, it went really well. I mean, perhaps you, perhaps I don't know if I can say something about these- words that we did together.

International Project Management Case Study

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:45:25

Yeah, happy to share.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:45:28

Yeah, so we have a class that is for it's called International Project Management and within this class the students basically learn the basics of project management at an international level. Some of them have experience working in project management. Others are not experienced in that field. Most of them are actually from the social sciences, so they haven't had any experience working for companies or, you know, for in in the commercial world. But we give them this training because we believe that when they finish they will a working teams and be work in projects. So this is why we teach them that.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:46:29

You know, it's part of their international, their master's in international studies here at the university. And when I talked to Fatima about this, you know idea that we should let the students work with an actual case. Not, you know, for many years I've been working on hypotheticals and simulations, but then we thought, how about let them work with a real case? And also that maybe they can learn a little bit not just about the classical project management tools, but also some of the work that Fatima is doing, you're in terms of agile, agile and the AMO method as well.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:47:25

Yeah, and the AMO method. So we started to have conversations in relation to how we would do it. We came to an agreement and basically Fatima was part of the teaching team, with students basically doing work for FATIMA and coming up with ideas with the Project Empire. That's what it was called. Yeah, you can probably give them more details about what they needed.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:48:04

Yeah, I think with that one.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:48:06

You know. The Project Empire was really about taking a, you know, a really large issue, which at the time it was the global sorry, it was the Australian Banking, Financial Services Royal Commission that was occurring sort of in 2019. And it was how do we take what has happened as a result of that Royal Commission and the issues and the challenges and all of the observations that were made around banking and financial services and actually identify some possible solutions? And so the students in your class and those listening Vladimir's class they banded together and, over a period of time, really took not only the theory that they were learning in the class, but also then some of the practical contributions to help identify solutions for the Banking and Royal Commission sort of project that we scoped out and planned for them. So it was a really interesting one. How do you, from the feedback you got from the students, Vladimir, how did you find that the students were able to integrate the theory they were learning and then the practical side and actually having that engagement with AMO throughout that journey?

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:49:21

I think they really enjoyed the setup. They enjoyed the interaction. I think they felt that this is actually something that we're doing for real, so it's not a simulation and, of course, they were a bit more careful about what they did, um, and they also you're much more interested, um. So, yeah, I had a. I guess we have a student who is now doing an internship with amo as as a result of that engagement. Yes, very exciting.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:50:11

Yeah, there were other students who were very inspired by the whole thing. There was only one student who questioned why we were working for AMO when they didn't know anything about the financial markets financial system in Australia. And I tried to explain to this student that in the world of consulting and in the work of project management, that you're basically thrown into the deep end. That you're basically thrown into the deep end, you know, when you're given a consulting job and you have to get up to speed with things that you have very little knowledge of and you have to do it quickly and you have to do it to a level that you sound confident. You know talking about these things. So you know I tried to explain to the student that it was going to be only after a few years that I was doing consulting, that she could choose the kind of consulting that she could do. But the first one that we're going to do were going to probably be things that she didn't have any knowledge about and you know this was just one of them. You know the financial sectors.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:51:36

Nobody in the class knew about finance, you know they.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:51:39

They were all new to it, so they had to get up to speed and just judging from the grades they got, we got a few very good grades. We got a few, you know, not so good grades, but these were the students not taking full advantage of the situation, I think. But it happens all the time with courses. You know, you get a bell curve, but in this particular class there was, I would say, a bias towards the good grades, which made me really happy. You know, it was a bell curve that was biased towards the better grades as opposed to the bad grades. So I was happy in that sense from my point of view.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:52:40

And yes, yes, I think that the university here likes to promote partnerships with organizations outside. So we thought that, because it enriches the students experience, and I think that these students got a lot. So they didn't just get, like I said, traditional project management methodologies, they also got AMO's methodology and hopefully, you know, they remember some of this thing and they can apply it. It's a lived experience, so it's not something that they just learn in a book.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:53:24

They actually did it, so I'm sure that they will be able to apply it later on in life definitely, definitely, and I'm actually seeing that firsthand, since we've got had sophie previous student from your class in our internship at the moment and she has been able to refer to things she learned in that course, both the the practical elements that AMO brought, but also the theory and and actually utilizing them day to day in her role as an intern with us, which has been fantastic.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:53:58

And then and then, the other positive thing that came out of it as well is, in addition to our partnership, the opportunity to actually leverage the insights and the work that the students had performed. So not only were they graded on them and, you know, assessed on them as part of their traditional university course, but actually we actually have leveraged the insights from those reports and the summaries and the plans and all of the work that students did. So it hasn't gone to waste, which I think is pretty the plans and all of the work that students did. So it hasn't gone to waste, which I think is pretty rewarding, considering a lot of the time. You know work gets done in school or university. It doesn't really go anywhere. So I hope that they like to hear that as well.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:54:39

Yes, definitely yes, and so I think that I think now, but in terms of what we're talking about there, before, you know governance, I think that the way the, the course was governed and you know what was in use of, to this kind of thing, so I would have been very surprised if if had turned out badly. I think that the, the, the communication between two of us, was really good. The, the input, the actual inputs from from you into the course, the students, was also really effective, and I think that you can see it now from the way the students are responding. So, yes, but I wonder how it would have gone if we had a different type of governance system. I think you were part of the, you effectively became part of the teaching team with access to everything here, and so I think that helped in all respects.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:56:18

Yeah, I think you're right. I think it definitely would have been interesting to see how different it would have been had, you know, someone from our team or myself been on site there. But actually being able to leverage technology tools to actually do some of our tasks remotely, I think was really positive, because we were able to not only teach the students how to use a new technology that most of them hadn't experienced before, but some of those students, as I've understood, continue to use that product now. I know that Sophie, our intern, is actually having to use a day-to-day, so the fact that she's learned has given her that added advantage. So, and personally, I am very grateful that we had the opportunity to work together. I feel like we've learned a lot as well on the academic side from yourself and the class, but actually just leveraging each other's knowledge and insight made it a very much enjoyable experience and I look forward to continue doing other things together in the coming months and years as well.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:57:26

Definitely yes.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:57:30

We'll see whether there's other opportunities For sure, absolutely Well, Vladimir, this has been a fantastic conversation. It's actually been the first long-form interview that I've had. Most of them are much shorter, and this one has just been one that I probably could continue talking to you for several hours more, which you know because we do talk often. I have a ton of questions that I would have loved to get through today, but unfortunately we run out of time. But I'm sure we'll probably do this again in the future and we can cover off all the ones we missed from today. So I guess, just in closing, I'm interested to know if there's anything else that you'd like to share with our listeners a call to action, a piece of advice, or maybe a question to ponder.

Vladimir Pacheco Cueva 1:58:22

I guess, being an educator, I always think that people we all need to learn more, you know are coming up, especially in this space of project management, Agile ideas I think you have a very good idea with AMO, so try stay abreast of these developments, I think, because it would help the practice of project management.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:59:15

Yes, absolutely, and as a profession, that's, yeah, really a really good point. Thank you for sharing that. I am very grateful that we have the chance to talk. I will share all of the key points that we talked about and your LinkedIn's and your socials and access to, if people wanted to find more out, find out more about you in our show notes, but otherwise, thank you again for joining me and I look forward to future conversations yes, thanks for inviting me to the podcast, and I hope that the listeners enjoyed it as much as I did.

Fatimah Abbouchi 1:59:57

I'm sure they did. I'm very sure they did. Thank you for listening to this podcast. We welcome any feedback. Please let us know by going to wwwagilemanagementofficecom forward slash agile ideas. You can also find us on most social media channels by searching agile ideas or follow me on LinkedIn. Thank you for listening. Please share or rate this if you enjoyed it. I hope you've been able to learn, feel, think or be inspired today. Until next time, what's your agile idea?